7:17-25 Let those who will not believe the promises of God, expect to hear the alarms of his threatenings; for who can resist or escape his judgments? The Lord shall sweep all away; and whomsoever he employs in any service for him, he will pay. All speaks a sad change of the face of that pleasant land. But what melancholy change is there, which sin will not make with a people? Agriculture would cease. Sorrows of every kind will come upon all who neglect the great salvation. If we remain unfruitful under the means of grace, the Lord will say, Let no fruit grow on thee henceforth for ever.

Verses 17-25. - THE DANGER TO JUDAH FROM ASSYRIA. The perversity of Ahaz, already rebuked in ver. 13, is further punished by a threat, that upon him, and upon his people, and upon his father's house, shall come shortly a dire calamity. The very power whose aid he is himself bent on invoking shall be the scourge to chastise both king and people (vers. 17-20). The land shall be made bare as by a razor (ver. 20). Cultivation shall cease; its scant inhabitants will support themselves by keeping a few cows and sheep (ver. 21), and will nourish themselves on dairy produce, and the honey that the wild bees produce (ver. 22). Briers and thorns will come up everywhere; wild beasts will increase; cattle will browse on the hills that were once carefully cultivated to their summits (vers. 23-25). Verse 17. - The Lord shall bring upon thee, etc. The transition from promises to threatenings is abrupt, and calculated to impress any one who was to any extent impressible. But Ahaz seems not to have had "ears to hear." From the day that Ephraim departed from Judah; i.e. from the time of the revolt under Jeroboam (1 Kings 12:16-24) - an evil day, which rankled in the mind of all true Judaeans. Even the King of Assyria. The construction is awkward, since "the King of Assyria' cannot well stand in apposition with "days." Hence many take the words for a gloss that has been accidentally intruded into the text (Lowth, Gesenius, Hitzig, Knobel, Cheyne). Others, however, see in the grammatical anomaly a grace of composition.

The Lord shall bring upon thee,.... These words are directed to Ahaz; and show, that though he and his kingdom would be safe from the two kings that conspired against him, yet evils should come upon him from another quarter, even from the Assyrians he sent to for help, and in whom he trusted; in which the Lord himself would have a hand, and permit them in his providence, in order to chastise him for his unbelief, stubbornness, and ingratitude in refusing the sign offered him, and for his other sins; and the calamities threatened began in his time; and therefore it is said, "upon thee"; for Tilgathpilneser, king of Assyria, to whom he sent for help, instead of helping and strengthening him, distressed him, 2 Chronicles 28:20,

and upon thy people, and upon thy father's house; so in the reign of his son Hezekiah, Sennacherib, king of Assyria, invaded the land of Judah, took all its fenced cities, excepting Jerusalem, and came up even to that, 2 Kings 18:13 and in the times of Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came up against Jerusalem, and destroyed it, and carried the people of Judah captive, 2 Kings 25:1 and these are the evil days, the days of affliction and adversity, here threatened:

days that have not come, from the day that Ephraim departed from Judah: meaning the revolt of the ten tribes from the house of David, in the times of Rehoboam, 1 Kings 12:16 which was a day of great adversity, a great affliction to the house of Judah; and there had been several evil days since, and that very lately; as when the king of Syria came into the land, and carried away great multitudes captives to Damascus; and when Pekah, king of Israel, slew in Judah, on one day, a hundred and twenty thousand valiant men, and carried captive two hundred thousand women, sons and daughters, with a great spoil, 2 Chronicles 28:5 and yet these were not to be compared with the calamitous times yet to come:

even the king of Assyria; or "with the king of Assyria", as the Vulgate Latin version renders it; rather the meaning is, that those days of trouble should come by the king of Assyria (i), as they did. The Septuagint version renders it, "from the day that Ephraim took away from Judah the king of the Assyrians"; and the Syriac and Arabic versions, just the reverse, "from the day that the king of the Assyrians", or "Assyria, carried away Ephraim from Judea"; neither of them right.

(i) "per regem Assyriae", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; and which is preferred by Noldius, Ebr. Concord. Part. p. 120, No. 616.

Isa 7:17-25. Fatal Consequences of Ahaz' Assyrian Policy.

Though temporary deliverance (Isa 7:16; 8:4) was to be given then, and final deliverance through Messiah, sore punishment shall follow the former. After subduing Syria and Israel, the Assyrians shall encounter Egypt (2Ki 23:29), and Judah shall be the battlefield of both (Isa 7:18), and be made tributary to that very Assyria (2Ch 28:20; 2Ki 16:7, 8) now about to be called in as an ally (Isa 39:1-6). Egypt, too, should prove a fatal ally (Isa 36:6; 31:1, &c.).

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